The story of Jimmy Junior Academy provides a great example of the impact that the mHub is having. Jimmy Junior is a nursery school that was created by Millicent Mbero. Until recently, various circumstances meant that many children from around Obambo village received no early childhood education. Through Jimmy Junior Academy, Millicent, a qualified teacher, provides early childhood education to children from the area surrounding Obambo village who would otherwise not receive it.

Millicent managed to get her project up and running off her own back. However, she operated solely out of a dilapidated church, and enrollment was low. The church, essentially built from sticks and mud, did not adequately shelter students from the elements, and was on the brink of collapse. All of her 20 students were taught from the church’s one room. When we learned of Millicent’s work here at mHub, we were able to connect her to The Pollination Project – an organisation that provides small grants to grassroots social visionaries. After receiving a grant of US $500 from The Pollination Project, Millicent was able to construct two new classrooms for her school. This has had a profound impact on Millicent’s capacity to realise her dream of providing early childhood education to all children from her village.

We were also able to connect Millicent with Tailored For Education – an organisation that provides uniforms to children who are unable to afford them. This has given Jimmy Junior the appearance of legitimacy it deserves which improves the perception of the school in the community. In the wake of these changes, enrollment has risen considerably. By charging a small fee to the parents of her students, Millicent has managed to hire another teacher, Christine Adhiambo, to assist her in conducting her classes. Millicent has to charge this fee in order to pay any teachers she hires, because the government does not fund early childhood education in Kenya.​

Millicent, Christine, and some of their students inside one of the new classrooms

​In the long term, Millicent hopes to expand the number of classes that she offers. She hopes to hire more teachers and begin attracting children in classes 2, 3, and 4. At the present time, after class 1, students are forced to attend government schools. While the government provides primary education for free (from class 1 onwards), there are many issues with government schools.

Firstly, the nearest government school is some distance away from Kanyawegi village – a distance that is unsuitable for such young children to have to travel, given that they must generally travel to and from school on foot. Further, government schools are known to have class sizes of up to 100, ruling out the provision of any individual attention to students and, therefore, several students fall dangerously behind. Parents must pay ‘tutoring’ fees if their children are to receive any individual assistance which often times are simply too expensive to afford. Schools also charge fees for uniforms and lunch is not provided. Thus, in reality, the education offered by government schools is not actually ‘free’ at all.

We will certainly be following Millicent’s progress closely, and doing our best to use our ever-growing network of partners to connect her with the resources she needs in order to realise her vision!